Kidnapped Nagorno-Karabakh man files appeal against unlawful 15-year prison sentence in Azerbaijan

YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 27, ARMENPRESS. Vagif Khachatryan, an elderly ethnic Armenian man from Nagorno-Karabakh who was kidnapped by Azeri border guards during his ICRC-mediated medical evacuation on July 29 and later sentenced to 15 years in prison in Azerbaijan on fabricated war crime charges, has appealed the verdict to a court of appeals, his lawyer told Azeri media.

Azeri authorities pressed fabricatedchargesagainst Khachatryan and jailed him in Baku.

The Armenian foreign ministry earliersaidthat the arrest of the Red Cross-protected patient from Nagorno-Karabakh amounts to war crime.

Prominent lawyer Siranush Sahakyansaidthat the kidnapping constitutes extraordinary rendition in terms of international law and a due process is therefore ruled out.

The kidnapped man’s daughter, in apleato the UN to ensure the safe release of her father, said that all charges pressed by the Azeri prosecution are fabricated and her father is innocent.

Khachatryan’s testimony in court was even distorted by an Azeri translator earlier in October.